Fresh Off The Back Of Postal Survey Failure, Lyle Shelton Reckons He’ll Try Politics Next
Ah yes, the well worn path from high profile failure to national politics.
It is our solemn duty to inform you that, fresh off the back of failing to convince Australians to oppose marriage equality, Australian Christian Lobby Managing Director Lyle Shelton has decided he’ll try going into politics.
It’s a bold move, less than two months after the phrase “eat shit, Lyle” trended on social media, but the bloke seems pretty determined. He’s quit his job and everything, and is moving back home to Queensland to start winning over hearts and minds.
We don’t know yet whether he’ll be gunning for federal or state politics, but the ABC is reporting that he’ll be joining Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives Party, and making an announcement with them tomorrow.
Excited for Lyle Shelton to follow the well worn path from high profile failure to national politics
— Rob Stott (@Rob_Stott) February 2, 2018
Shelton broke the news of his career shift this morning in an Australian Christian Lobby video that is, inexplicably, six whole minutes long. The first thirty seconds feels more like it’s gearing up towards a marriage announcement than a resignation — Lyle appears on a grassy slope outside Parliament House alongside Jim Wallace, ACL chairman, and stares intently at him as Wallace smilingly details how “Lyle and I have been together now for a lot of years”, and what a great time those years have been.
Eventually, though, the video gets to the point: the postal survey really revved Shelton up for actual politics, and he firmly believes “that politics needs a Christian influence from the inside”. He seems to conceive of the whole thing as a kind of League of Legends type scenario, assuring Christian viewers that he’s “not leaving the battle for the values that you and I hold dear — just simply going to a different part of the battlefield.”
The video also reveals who’ll be taking over Shelton’s gig at the ACL. Nearly three minutes in, the camera pans over to reveal that a third man has been awkwardly standing just out of frame for the entire thing. It’s a compelling twist.
The new guy, for what it’s worth, reckons there’s “never been more pressure on people of faith or on the Church simply for living out our timeless convictions”, which shows an extraordinary lack of understanding of the history of Christianity. In this sense, he seems to already be following in Shelton’s time-honoured footsteps, spouting totally false fearmongering and getting brutally owned.
If you have six minutes to spare, you can watch the full video announcement below.